Help! Astrophotography always blurry/noisy :/

[0ptics]

Hello!

I've done numerous star photos with my Nikon D7100, but they never come out as sharp as others' photos on 500px, Flickr, instagram, etc. Idk what I'm doing wrong, but it'll be great if you all can help me !

I understand that I should use a wide angle lens, tripod, shoot wide open, use a remote, etc., but even after doing everything that basic tutorials tell me to do, my star photos are always extremely noisy thus making me have to over use the "Noise Reduction: Luminance" tool on Lightroom. I'm currently using a Nikon D7100 & Nikon 17-55mm f/2.8.

I know I am using a super high ISO for my star photos (about>3200), but if I don't my photos come out so dark! Here's an example of the blurry & noisy photos of mine (you can see the mountain in the first link and the foreground in the second link are obviously not sharp):

Womb (ISO 4000)

Pillars of Sagittarius (ISO 4000)

Here's some of the examples of sharp astrophotography that I'm looking to achieve with my photos (eg. Michael Shainblum & Dave Morrow). Both their star photos are SO SHARP and the foreground are so bright! I'm not too familiar with the technique, but am I suppose to "photo blend" them using photoshop in order to achieve these results?

Temple of Moonlight

A Place We Call Home - Alvord Desert, Oregon

THANK YOU !

--
Charles Wang

 

[weepete]

They look like HDR to me. So in order do do that you'll need to take one exposure for the sky and one exposure for the foreground and blend them in photoshop. My own favorite method to do this is using luminace masks.

Here is a tutorial from one of the photogrphers you mention:

 

[weepete]

And here is a free tutorial by the same guy

http://www.davemorrowphotography.com/p/tutorial-shooting-night-sky.html

 

[fmw]

Use a low ISO and a long exposure time. Auto exposure won't get the job done.

 

[KmH]

The shot linked to by Dave Morrow showed he used a 14 mm focal length, 30 second exposure @ ISO 320 and f/2.8.

There is a limit to how long an exposure can be before the stars start to make trails, because the Earth is always turning on its axis of rotation.
The shorter the focal length the lens is the long an exposure can be before stars trail.
Which part of the sky you shoot also affects how quickly stars will trail.

Like most photography genres, having a deep understanding of all the nuances is what it takes to consistently make high quality images.

 

[Big Red Dobie]

Here's a link that I found - might be useful to you - there is a part about stacking on the bottom of the page. Learn How to Photograph the Milky Way!

 

[dennybeall]

You can see in your shot that the exposure is too long since the stars are showing a trail, very short trail, so it looks blurry at a glance. The person by the tent is showing movement also.
Keep in mind that there are tricks to just about everything and using the tricks is the only way in many cases. Dark areas and light areas take different exposures or you have to use added light. A flash to light a mountain would be a neat trick..............